Hector Barbera’s altercation with his girlfriend - apparently she wanted to break it off - got very messy because lover’s spat turned into a brawl that saw his girlfriend end up in the hospital with some bruises, with the two later carted off before a judge in one of Spain’s domestic violence courts in record time.

Both Barbera and his ex(?) girlfriend both received suspended sentences, with the Spanish rider’s six month sentence commuted to community service.

Barbera has released the following statement on his Facebook page where he apologizes to everyone and says he was treated unfairly by the press and lynched by fans who didn’t know the whole truth.

Continue reading: Hector Barbera issues apology statement

Justice is swift in Spain. Hector Barbera who was allegedly accused of beating up his girfriend in a hotel room in Jerez de la Frontera has already been sentenced and released.

The Avintia Blusens rider and his girlfriend were both tried in a domestic violence court who decided that the couple was equally responsable for the altercation and sentenced the Spanish rider to six months in prison, but the sentence was immediately commuted to community service.

Barbera’s girlfriend, DP, was was also sentenced to five months, but the sentence was suspended because the girl had no priors according to Europa Press.

Barbera will be riding in the French GP at Le Mans next weekend.

MotoGP rider Hector Barbera has been arrested on the suspicion of assaulting his girlfriend in at hotel at Jerez de la Frontera.

Barbera, who raced his Avintia Blusen’s CRT machine in last Sunday’s GP was still in town enjoying a few days off when he was arrested by the police on Friday morning.

According to the online pubblication diariodecadiz.es, the police received a call from the Jerez Hospital informing that they had a woman in their care who showed signs of being physically abused.

The girl, a 23-year-old from Jerez received medical treatment for contusions and bruises and spent the night in hospital after allegedly being assaulted by the MotoGP rider.

Barbera was taken to the police station and now will have to face an “expedited trial” under Spain’s specialized courts for violence against women, and his partecipation in next week’s Le Mans GP is now strongly in doubt.

The 26-year old Spanish rider already has an arrest record, when he was found driving under the influence in January 2012.

Update:

The following statement has been released on Barbera’s Facebook page:

In relation to the arrest of Hector Barbera.
The facts alleged and the information published on the subject are devoid of truth. Hector has made himself available to the relevant authorities to clarify the facts. More information will released in time.

At the Monteblanco circuit in Spain, Avintia Racing (formerly known as By Queroseno Racing - BQR) officially presented their 2013 MotoGP and Moto2 line-up in a special event that included sponsors and guests taking to the track in a selection bikes supplied by Josè Cardoso’s (former MotoGP and Superbike rider) riding school.

Avintina Racing will be fielding in MotoGP former 250cc World Champion Hiroshi Aoyama who is returning to the premier class after an unhappy year in World Superbikes, and Hector Barbera who after a difficult and injury packed last season on a Pramac Ducati, will be riding the team’s FTR Kawasaki’s.

While their Moto2 squad will see the GP debute of 21-year old English rider Kyle Smith who previously raced in the Spanish CEV in the Formula Xtreme championship finishing second overall in 2012, and the first ever Moto2 World champion Toni Elias who will have Kalexs at their disposal.

“Raúl knows me since I was in the Spanish Championship and whenever we met in the paddock he told me: “when I have a team of MotoGP, we will be together”. It was true and we have got it! I have to thank you because Avintia Blusens has believed in me and I want to return all the effort of the team with a good job this season. In the pre-season we have improved a lot and in the last test we were three tenths slower than the official bikes of CRT. It will be hard to beat them, but in a short time we have advanced a lot,” said Hector Barbera.

“In the last Valencia GP I already ran with Avintia Blusens as a guest rider and I had a very good impression of the team. So I am happy to be in this team and we have done a pre-season that makes me think that we can have a good year,” commented Aoyama.

In 2012 MotoGP saw rain at some point during 14 out of 18 race weekends, and the 2013 season looks to be starting off in the same manner, as the second and final day of ECU testing at Sepang for the three CRT teams who will be using the Magneti Marelli spec ECU was ruined by rain and continuing technical issues.

Danilo Petrucci who put in the most laps yesterday with Came IodaRacing’s Suter- BMW managed only four laps running again completely without electronic aids before suffering a technical glitch, and he also had to share his bike with team mate Lukas Pesek. Apparently the team only brought two machines for the five day test, but not enough spare parts to run both bikes that still have the 2012 chassis. Despite the numerous setbacks Pesek was able to put in 19 laps today.

Avintia Blusens’ Hiroshi Aoyama rested his injured left wrist today, deciding not to risk riding in the rain, while Hector Barbera again suffered electric issues with his bike’s wiring loom that cut power, although he managed 20 laps.

Continue reading: Second day of CRT testing at Sepang hampered by rain and problems

The first day of testing at the Sepang International circuit for the three CRT teams that will be using the spec Magneti Marelli ECU was hindered by a myraid of different problems that limited track action.

Only two riders actually set lap times, one was Ioda Racing’s Danilo Petrucci who managed to put in 27 laps with a best time of 2.06.841 on his 2012 version of the Suter- BMW with the new ECU, while his new team mate Lukas Pesek did none.

Recovering Hiroshi Aoyama was the second rider to record any lap times as he did nine laps, testing more the fitness of his recently broken wrist, than actually working on the development on the Avintia Blusens FTR-Kawasaki, and his time was 2.12.062, but he complained of pain and will decide tomorrow whether to continue.

Aoyama’s team mate Hector Barbera managed in the 8-hour test only four laps with both wiring and electronic issues curtailing his test and no lap times were recorded as the Spaniard did not complete one single recordable full lap.

Colin Edwards and Claudio Corti wasted the entire day sitting on the sidelines watching their NGM Forward Racing team building their bikes, as they received several parts late. Only Edwards did one lap with his new FTR-Kawasaki before the track closed at 6pm.

Missing from the ECU test is Michael Laverty as his PBMUK squad decided to delay the debut of their own PBM-01 CRT machine (GPMS/Aprilia) until the second Sepang test scheduled from February 26-28.

With track time hindered none of the riders had real chance to test the new CRT-specific softer compound rear tires that Bridgestone will supply to all CRT teams.

All six riders will have another day of private testing tomorrow, before being joined by the rest of the MotoGP and CRT teams (running Aprilia electronics) on Tuesday for another three days of official testing.

The Spanish sports brand Joma and Avintia Racing have come to an agreement, so the sports equipment brand will be the team’s official clothing provider for the next season. Joma will take care of the riders Héctor Barberá, Toni Elías, Hiroshi Aoyama and Kyle Smith as well as all the staff’s needs during the races of the 2013 season.

For Joma the collaboration with Avintia Racing will be the first time in the motor racing world on a big level and the agreement has come from the support of two 100% Spanish companies. Joma has always traveled around the world being proud to be a Spanish company and now together with Avinitia Racing in the world motorcycling championship has the objective to keep supporting the national sports image.

Avintia Racing is a team with a lot of experience and at the moment has the means and potential to be considered as one of the best teams in the categories it competes in. For its part, Joma is the first Spanish sports brand on a global level. Founded in 1965 by D. Fructuoso López, its capital is 100% Spanish and the central offices are situated in Portillo de Toledo. They were visited recently by Héctor Barberá and Toni Elías to get to know firsthand the work their new sponsor does.

Continue reading: Avintia Racing signs new sponsorship deal with Joma Sports

On the final day of the MotoGP and SBK tests at Jerez de la Frontera, the rain unfortunately prevented teams and riders from continuing with the development of the bikes in view of the 2013 season. The riders of the three MotoGP teams that have been testing in Spain since Wednesday (the factory Ducati Team, Ducati Pramac Racing and Avintia Blusens) did not put their noses out of the garage, with the exception of a 10 laps stint from Nicky Hayden (who scored an excellent 1 40.090 yesterday on the dry) and newly appointed Ducati test rider Michele Pirro, who completed just 6 laps.

The adverse weather conditions certainly did not encouraged Andrea Dovizioso to get back on the track: the Italian is still suffering from a neck muscle injury that prevented him from exploiting these three days of test properly (he just did a couple of laps on the first day). ‘Dovi’ will undergo surgery next Tuesday to remove a plate from his collarbone, and will definitely be back on his new Ducati Desmosedici at the Sepang test, next February.

Andrea Iannone, the new rookie of the Ducati Pramac Racing team, and the two new signings of the Avintia Blusens team, Hector Barbera and Hiroshi Aoyama, preferred to settle for what was accomplished in the previous days, whereas the riders of the Ducati Alstare SBK team, Carlos Checa and Ayrton Badovini, just did some parade lap on the wet track before calling it a day. As far as we know, BMW Italia GoldBet riders Marco Melandri and Chaz Davies did not even put the leathers on.

According to Spanish website motocuatro.com, Hector Barbera has signed a two-year deal to ride for Avintia Blusens CRT team.

The Spaniard - who will probably need a bodyguard to defend himself from angry Dani Pedrosa fans in next week’s Motorland Aragaon MotoGP round after what happened at Misano - was left without a ride when Ducati decided to take over the Pramac squad and field Ben Spies and Andrea Iannone in 2013 and his only hope to continue in MotoGP was to turn to a CRT team as there is still only one MotoGP satellite machine left to be assigned, and Barbera was never on Fausto Gresini’s shopping list.

The Spanish website is also reporting that Barbera will be receiving 200,000 euros per season (which is a big jump from the 50,000 he was reportedly receiving from Pramac) and also had the same economic offer from Ioda Racing.

We expect that the official confirmation will be coming next week, and at the moment it isn’t known whether he will replace David Salom, who just joined the team replacing Ivan Silva or Colombian rider Yonny Hernandez.

Apparently there have been some nasty insinuations, in some obscure and convoluted way, that what happened to Dani Pedrosa during the Misano GP was somehow Karel Abraham and his team Cardion AB’s fault, and this has irked the Czech team enough to have felt it was necessary to issue a statement to explain what happened to Abraham’s Ducati on the starting grid (they had already did it with the post-race press release.)

A rapid look at the rule book to check out section 1.18 should also clear up any doubts on how the starting procedures work and should also clarify why Pedrosa was given start at the back of the grid penalty in the first place and then everyone knows what happened on the first lap.

The Spaniard’s disappointment is more than completely understandable, he was tipped to win the race and cut Lorenzo’s point lead even further, but the ‘total chaos’ on the grid before the re-start was a problem that only his team suffered. When the Repsol Honda mechanic began removing the front tire warmer (rewatching the footage you can see in the background the other teams also begin removing theirs) they probably went into some sort of panic when it jammed, which forced them to drag the bike off the grid to the pitlane in order for the warmer to be freed.

How anything that happened after the restart can be placed on Cardion AB’s shoulders is really incomprehensible. Here’s their press release:

We would like to clarify the speculations that have been spreading with regard to an unusual situation which occurred before the start of the San Marino Grand Prix on Sunday, 16 September, and which affect the reputation of the Cardion AB Motoracing team.

Unfortunately, the defect occurred during the sighting lap after the level of the fluid had dropped below the critical level and the clutch became inoperative. Consequently, our rider’s engine stalled after he had shifted into first gear before the start into the warm-up lap. Having been given a push by marshals, he made the warm-up lap during which the defect was not apparent. It occurred again when he shifted into first gear and the engine stalled again. Pursuant to the applicable MotoGP rules, Karel raised his hand to notify the race direction and the starting procedure was halted right before the start.

Continue reading: Cardion AB MotoGP irked by Misano GP insinuations